A few minutes later, with wild yells, the brown-visaged quartette rode up to me, addressing rapidly-uttered questions in Arabic, which I answered coolly.
I told them that I had no sympathy with war, that I was a trader from El Biodh, and that my destination was In Salah, where I constantly had commercial transactions.
“But how camest thou here?” asked the great black-bearded fellow who had first addressed me, as he fixed his keen eyes upon mine.
“I rode,” I replied in Arabic, a language in which I was fortunately proficient. “Allah hath protected me.”
“Didst thou not see the red-legged French dogs?”
“Yes, I passed them yesterday. There are thousands of them.”
This statement seemed to cause them considerable dismay. They held a hurried conversation in an undertone, and then informed me that I should have to go before the Sheikh.
An hour later, I was taken before the chief of the tribe, who was seated cross-legged on a mat outside his tent. He was a grey-bearded, wizen-faced old man, whose eyes had lost none of the dark brilliance of youth, and whose teeth shone white in contrast with his red lips and sun-tanned yellow face. As I was led up to him, and the manner in which I had been discovered explained, he slowly removed his long pipe from his mouth, and regarded me critically.
“Thou sayest the French, the accursed offspring of Eblis, are numerous? Where didst thou see them?”
“In an oasis near Tighehert.”